New offshore wind terminal for German port

The expanded terminal will get 1,250m of quay wall for heavy loads, 38 hectares of storage and three new berths, says DEME, one of the contractors involved, alongside German civil engineering firms Depenbrock and TAGU.

Two trailing suction hopper dredgers, a backhoe dredger and several barges will be deployed to dredge more than three million cubic metres of material, which will form new land in what DEME area manager Lutz Dröge calls -‘a dynamic estuarine environment’.

“Construction of the expanded terminal requires an innovative technical approach,” he said. “The project includes the installation of combi-walls and land reclamation in a dynamic estuarine environment, meeting the complex engineering requirements tailored to a heavy load terminal and demanding geo-terchnical conditions.”

Operated by Niedersachsen Ports, Cuxhaven has already been widely used as a base port for offshore wind farms, including Norsee 1, 2 and 3; Albatros and Hohe See; the North Sea Cluster projects Borkum Riffgrund and Gode; Meerwind Southeast; Global Tech 1 and Trianel Windpark.

As well as its heavy-lift and assembly capabilities, Cuxhaven is also a base for vessel service and maintenance.

The expansion work at Cuxhaven will begin next year and is expected to take three and a half years.